That woman was Candice Glover, 23, of St. Helena Island, S.C., who'd spent three years chasing that dream and been rejected in two previous seasons.

Candice became the first woman in six years to win Idol, beating runner-up Kree Harrison, 23, of Woodville, Tex.

Did the right woman win? In my view, yes.

I didn't love everything that Candice ever did, but she had the best technical ability of any of the top five girls and made some of the smartest song choices. She also gave my absolute favourite performance of the season with The Cure's “Lovesong.” And it was hard, although not impossible, to believe that she would lose after her bravura performance of “I Who Have Nothing” on Wednesday night.

But viewers who vote are unpredictable. Kree was a sweetheart with a heartbreaking back story who also gave an excellent performance on Wednesday, so I was in genuine suspense until Ryan Seacrest read Candice's name in the Nokia Theatre.

Candice, who had been locked in an affectionate clinch with Kree up until Seacrest read the results, put her hand to her mouth, buried her face in Kree's shoulder and was engulfed by other members of the Idol top 10.

And, after weeks of strong, reliable performances, Candice was so overcome by emotion she had difficulty singing her victory song and new single, “I Am Beautiful.”

The rest of the two-hour finale was filled with the usual contestant and guest performances, although judges and former judges were onstage almost as much as members of the top 10.

The contestants started it off with a group performance of The Wanted's “Glad You Came.”

Then it was fifth place finisher Janelle Arthur's turn, as she joined The Band Perry on “Done” and did well not only keeping up vocally but with the choreography.

Before the next performance, a video package used humour to tackle allegations that producers had fixed or manipulated the contest to get a female winner.

It featured the top five guys claiming tongue in cheek that they'd been sabotaged by the top five girls. For instance, we saw Janelle changing the notes on “(They Long to Be) Close to You” on Lazaro Arbos' sheet music just before his almost tone-deaf performance of the song, and Candice shaking Burnell Taylor down for lunch money, supposedly the real reason for his weight loss. And the mastermind of the sabotage was revealed to be Season 6 champion Jordin Sparks. Sparks joked that the men were easy to eliminate because “none of you guys played guitar.”

The last joke got in a shot at Idol's ratings rival: “The good news is Idol leftovers have been doing really well on The Voice,” Jordin said.

Other attempts at humour included contestants mocking the judges, whether it was Mariah Carey's constant use of the word “darling,” Keith Urban's extensive wardrobe of T-shirts, Randy Jackson's overuse of the phrase “in it to win it” or Nicki Minaj's wigs. I admit I chuckled a little at the contestants wearing various colourful wigs, but I gasped a little at Devin Velez wearing not only a blue wig but leopard print pants with butt padding to imitate Minaj.

Minaj was the only one of the four judges who didn't perform on the finale.

Carey did a a very quick medley of her hits, perched like a wedding cake topper on a pedestal in a sparkly, feathery mermaid gown.

Urban got to sing twice: his current single “Little Bit of Everything” with his band; and his 2001 hit “Where the Blacktop Ends,” accompanied by Kree, Jackson on bass and Travis Barker on drums (plus an uncredited Ray Chew on keyboards).

The top five guys and girls got to perform with singing legends and I thought the girls got the better deal. The men accompanied Frankie Valli, who sounded a little like he'd been sucking on helium. The women got Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin. Even though she was singing via video link from New York and occasionally mumbling her lyrics, she still sounded pretty terrific.

The best of the night for me was not PSY performing “Gentleman” with his loopily entertaining dancing; or Amber Holcomb teaming with Emeli Sande on “Next to Me,” although both women looked gorgeous; or Jennifer Lopez and Pitbull lip-synching and booty-shaking through “Live It Up”; or Candice and Kree dueting on “One Less Bell to Answer” and “A House Is Not a Home.”

The performances I enjoyed most were Candice and Jennifer Hudson trading melisma and lung power on “Inseparable”; and third place finisher Angie Miller teaming with Season 8 runner-up Adam Lambert on “Titanium.”

Since I'm a huge Adam fan, it was a thrill to see him back onstage and I thought he and Angie sounded terrific together.

Angie got almost as much exposure as the top two, following up her Lambert duet by joining her idol Jessie J. on “Domino.”

Not only had British diva Jessie flown in from the U.K. especially to perform with Angie (and promote her new single, “Wild”), she invited Angie to fly to the U.K. to perform her new single, “You Set Me Free,” with Jessie J. That sounds like a nice consolation prize for the girl who many people thought was going to win Idol.

Last but not least there was a tribute to Jackson, who previously announced that Season 12 would be his last.

It started with a video of talking dogs at a table (get it? the dawg?) that turned into a tribute video in which we got to see clips of a heavier Jackson with worse hair.

“I think I speak on behalf of a lot of people in America and our producers when I say the door is always open, my brother,” Seacrest said afterward.

Jackson said he felt blessed and honoured and hoped he touched the lives of all the people who came on the show. “They certainly touched mine,” he said.

Jackson is gone, Minaj is said to be going. Can Carey and Urban be far behind?

Once all the confetti is cleared away and the machines that shoot sparks and fire are stored for another year, producers will be figuring out to retool Idol to hold onto its ratings and beat back The Voice.

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